Commitment

The Church bit that follows is by way of an introduction, it gets more secular after the next two paragraphs.

Radio 4 is my source of news in the morning, I listen while I am showering, making my breakfast and generally getting ready to take on the day ahead. I usually mentally tune out when Thought for the Day comes on; however, a few days ago the opening announcement caught my attention when Rev Dr Isabelle Hamley was introduced as the Theological Adviser to the House of Bishops. Why does the House of Bishops, the upper house of the General Synod of the Church of England, need a theological adviser? Surely by the time you have made it to a Bishop and are sitting in the upper house you know a lot about the nature of God and religious belief and should not need an theological adviser.

That is why I was listening when she quoted from Nietzsche, not something you would expect from someone deep in the structure of the Church; Nietzsche was highly critical of the Church as an organisation. The quote was:

The essential thing "in heaven and on earth," so it appears, is, to make the point again, that there is obedience for a long time and in one direction: in the process there comes and always has come eventually something for whose sake living on earth is worthwhile, for example, virtue, art, music, dance, reason, spirituality - something or other transfiguring, subtle, amazing, and divine.

In modern language obedience can be replaced with commitment. Commitment for a long time and in one direction will produce something that makes life worth living. I pondered this in light of my own experience and had to agree with Nietzsche. I made a commitment to the Comrades Marathon, travelling every year to take part in this gruelling 56-mile footrace. That was for a long time – ten years. I was rewarded with wonderful experiences that changed my life, gave rise to wonderful friendships and the start of my love for South Africa.

I then committed to the Kalahari Augrabies Extreme Marathon, also in South Africa, in 2007, and am still committed. Again, that has provided some amazing experiences, deep friendships and has had not only a profound affect on my life, but has been a very enriching experience for my two daughters. It gave rise to a book about my running experiences which in turn lead to creative writing. I could have done those events once and moved on and missed the transfiguring, subtle, amazing, and divine.

At the beginning of 2022 I was planning how I would approach the year ahead and decided “obedience for a long time and in one direction” would provide the most rewarding experience. During the two years of Covid-19 restrictions I had missed volunteering on activity breaks with the charity Go Beyond and decided that would be the commitment. I rearranged my diary and minor commitments so that I would be free to volunteer on weeks when they were running breaks and committed to volunteer on ten different weeks spread throughout 2022. It was not easy, and some things had to go before I could get the ten weeks booked. Sacrifices had to be made. I have completed five weeks so far, with two scheduled for July, a break in August then again in October, due to the commitment to the Kalahari Augrabies Extreme Marathon, two in November and the final one in December.

Already I have experienced the transfiguring, subtle, amazing, and divine from the experiences I have had with the children, developing deeper relationships with the staff, getting to know fellow volunteers and from driving the minibus – I love driving.

Rev Dr Isabelle Hamley also made the point that as well as big stuff we also need small actions to reach our goals quoting from Zechariah, a book in the Old Testament, warning us to ‘not despise the day of small things because God sees everything’. You could rephrase that as small things matter, whether that is our individual steps to tackle climate change, a word of encouragement to someone who is struggling, a post on social media to promote a charity or a training run in pursuit of finishing that big race.

You could consider having no commitments to be freedom. That brings to mind the lines in Me And Bobby McGee sung by Janis Joplin.

Freedom is just another word for nothin' left to lose

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